‘Grudge’ Financier Entertainment Farm Files for Bankruptcy

TOKYO — Entertainment Farm, a Tokyo-based film financier launched in 2002, has begun bankruptcy proceedings. The amount of its corporate debt, owned to 20 business partners, stands at a reported $13 million.

Under the leadership of former international banker Yasushi Kotani, Entertainment Farm underwrote both foreign and domestic pics, including “The Grudge,” Takashi Shimizu’s 2004 Hollywood remake of his seminal J-horror hit “Juon: The Grudge” (2002), and “Tokyo Sonata,” (pictured) Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s 2008 drama about a dysfunctional family that won the Cannes Un Certain Regard Jury Prize.

Many of the company’s Japanese films of the 2000s were in the then-hot J-horror genre, though its foreign productions tended to be artier, including the last, Jim Jarmusch’s 2009 “The Limits of Control.”

In recent years, however, hits have been harder to come by, as has additional financing, driving the company deeper into debt. On Jan. 22, Entertainment Farm filed bankruptcy papers with Tokyo District Court.